I *AM SO* SPIDERMAN!

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Home Sweet Home

Day 10. I woke up with a migraine today, probably due to the weather. I think we had a tornado tear through Canyon Lake last n night. The wind was blowing harder than it did in Houston during Hurricane Rita. In any case, I wasn’t able to make the shoot. Russ called later on to say that the weather was great, and they were getting great footage.

I’m home now, and get to sleep in my own bed! Not that it wasn’t nice staying at Russ’ home (pictured here):


Shooting picks up again Friday, but I won’t be back in San Antonio until Saturday, since I’m working.

Day 9

It has been a bad day. It is pretty ugly outside, with completely overcast skies and lots of sprinkles, scattered thunderstorms are on the way, and all of our shots scheduled are outdoors. I did have cover sets, but one of our main actresses, Sherri, needs to get back to Dallas this afternoon so she can work.

Ashley (aka Amanda) had a car wreck on the way to our location today as well. She is ok, just shaken up, and the car is totalled.

We cancelled the shots we had planned, and are trying to go ahead and get at least two of them done today, which don't involve her. Other than that, Russ was really pissed off when we got back to his house, not because we cancelled today, but because he feels things are pretty disorganized, and he could be using this time to edit his own short.

I don't think we are too disorganized, but not everyone is keeping focus. Last night, Robin and Russ spent an hour shooting someone sleeping. The tension is really high right now.

Anyway, Russ is in a better mood now, and invited me out to dinner with him tonight, to meet up with another filmmaker he says he admires a lot, Richard Bosse. I'd enjoy it, although I think we will be working late. Not into the morning, but too late for dinner.

Today (Day 8) and yesterday have been amazingly relaxing, in stark contrast to most of our other days.

Thursday, we shot at the clinic where Russ' doctor works, and that went very smoothly. When they were close to wrapping, a group of us headed out with whatever equipment we could, and started to set up at Robin's home for the rest of the shoot.

We shot all of Larry Laverty's (Doc Anderson) scenes, and were planning to do a scene we missed last week with Laura (Courtney) and Matt (Royse). However, Laura had hurt her back the other day, and hasn't been to a doc or taken anything for it, so she was in severe pain and couldn't stay to do the shoot. Still, we didn't finish up until 4:00 am, and everyone was moaning about my decision to go to the school at 8:00 in the morning.

Daybreak came, and I was the first one up...so I started to load up all the equipment into Russ' truck. Since he and Mark were crashed in Robin's living room, that woke them up. Then I called Robin on her cell phone to wake her. We got out to the set at 9:00; imagine what would have happened if I had capitulated and let them have the 10 AM call time they were begging for!

She did show up for today's shoot at the school where Robin works, and she is at this very moment shooting at Russ's house. One of his bedrooms is doubling as hers. For most of the crew, it has been a day of sitting around and doing nothing...which as I said is very relaxing. The actors, Russ, and Robin, and our sound man, Richard, are the only ones allowed in the room. No, it's not a sex scene!

In any case, this was a much needed break.

Here's a few bonus photos for folks reading my blog here instead of on myspace.

Production Stills

Click HERE for photos from our shoot!

There are (at this writing) four pages worth, so be sure to click the page links under the last row of pictures.

Day 6

We are now, in theory, halfway done with shooting Water's Edge. Today was a bit frustrating for me; in fact the most frustrating of the shooting days so far.

One of our actors, Larry Laverty, has flown in from California at his own expense. He bunked down at the house we shot at last night; but Russ had to go pick him up, which added an extra hour to his trip. That meant that Mark and I had to find Bandera on our own from Canyon Lake. It turned out to be surprisingly easy.

The Bandera County Sheriff's Department opened up their offices to us, and a cute guy named Kerry was in charge of keeping us in line. I tried to get him in front of the camera, but he was too shy. Anyway, we had Matt (aka Royse) on location to shoot his scene, but didn't have the white van we needed. I saw one at a Baptist church across the street, and Russ and I went to talk to the pastor about using it--but it wouldn't have been available until late afternoon.

Craig (aka Officer Wallace) had to work until 1 o'clock to save his job (he is a construction contractor on the side), so we got in and shot our scene with Jerry (aka County Coroner Gerald) and Sherry (aka Karyn), because it was the only scene wherein all the actors had arrived. While that was in progress, I sent Johnny Quest out to find a white van we could use, and he came through, as always! So, after finishing the shot with Jerry, we did Matt's, which worked out very well. One of the deputies named Lalio, who was also rather cute--and a former film student--acted as our jailer. We finished just as Craig pulled up.

The biggest frustration began after that. Robin did not have a shot breakdown for today, so Russ and I took the initiative and blocked out our next scene. It would have looked great, but Robin insisted that she wanted Karyn plopping down on a curb instead of a bench. She and Russ spent two hours trying to get their blocking figured out.

After they shot the master scene, an air conditioner kicked on, and they were trying wait it out before getting coverage. Before we finished, Kerry told us that he had to lock up the offices in an hour. That sent us scrambling for another location. Once again, it was JQ to the rescue. He convinced the Bandera Chamber of Commerce to stay late and let us use their offices. Even though Patricia Moore of the BCOC said she would be happy to stay as late as necessary, I don't think she realized we would be shooting until 11:30 pm.

Also today, screwed up and didn't tell one of our actresses that we had changed the shoot time from 8am to noon; so she arrived in Bandera (from San Antonio) too early. She was not too upset though, since her mother lives there, so she stopped in for a visit.

Now, if I could just find my notebook that had my script, strip boards, and contact information.

Day 3, 4 and 5

The past few days of shooting have been long and exhausting.

On day 3, we did our first interior shots. We spent 2 1/2 hours shooting video of Royse (the lead character) sulking in his bedroom; then we moved out to our "Dockett Home Exterior" location too late to shoot the scene that was supposed to be shot during the Magic Hour (that's sundown, when the light is a pretty gold/orange). One of the actors we needed for the other scenes went to the wrong location, though, so We decided to rig up some lights while we were waiting, and try our Magic Hour shot anyway, since we had called Amanda all the way out there. It didn't work out right, and we will have to reshoot it. That alone took another 3 hours. and by the time we were finished, it was 4am and we were all freezing and cranky. We did have another guy show up who was working on another project with Craig (Officer Wallace), who had some helpful lighting suggestions and was willing to pitch in. I can't remember his name off hand.

Day 4--what a night! We shot out at Comal Park, right on the lakeshore. John Quest talked the Army Corp of Engineers, which oversees the park, into giving us carte blanche after the park closed, including being able to set a bonfire, despite the statewide burn ban. We got some nice shots, but Robin wasn't sticking to her plan of going through the same scene all night with different POV's...so we are going to have to reshoot that as well, if she wants to flashback the way she scripted it.

Day 5, after some discussion between Mark, Russ Ansley (our Diirector of Photography) and Myself, we determined that the problems that have been slowing us down are a) too much meandering among the crew between shots; and b) not sticking to the shots we had planned. We pretty much corrected those problems during last night's shoot, and everything stayed on schedule. In fact, we finished 30 minutes before I thought we would. We didn't ever have the smashed vase or broken table that Robin had in the script, but it all looked good from what I could see, and the fight scene was realistic enough to hurt Craig. We now have 2 injured actors. Laura (playing the role of Courtney Dockette) hurt her back at the beach doing push ups between takes, yesterday.

The home we shot at belonged to a friend of Russ', and was a huge 2 story mansion on the lake. The owner, Ian, and his 12 year old son were there while we were shooting, and both had to be up in the morning...but I know we were so loud that we kept them awake. It was nice of Ian not to throw us out.

Russ' wife, Lisa, also came back from a trip to Galveston last night, so not only did we have an extra pair of hands, but Russ says she'll feed us well for the rest of the shoot :)

Water's Ege Day 2

Things got off to a slow start today. Mark and I followed Russ out to the location; it took about 45 minutes to get there. Once we were there, it took a little while to get set up. Energy was low all around; but picked up after we broke for lunch.

Our lead showed up at 8:30 as scheduled; but it wasn't until 1:00 or so when we finally got to him. He wasn't too upset though, or if he was it didn't show. Our day was set for 9 hours today; and it took 11. More productive than yesterday, but still too slow. We did get some nice shots though. Today wasn't as difficult either, since there was plenty of shade to duck under, and benches to rest on.

Our set was Holmes High School in San Antonio. What a beautiful campus it is! We had a bus load of kids that we had as extras yesterday, but they didn't show up today. Apparently, they were all friends of our location coordinator's son...and he was supposed to tell them all where to be. The only problem was that they went out to party yesterday after the shoot; and the guy ended up dropping his cell phone into a pool, and lost all their numbers. We lucked out though; a volleyball team was practicing at the school today, and their coach allowed them out of practice to be our extras. Half the crew had to be extras as well. I think I can be seen walking through the background in 3 different shirts. We were joking that we could have an extra on the DVD... "Where's Bob."

Tomorrow, I'm driving into San Antonio again to have lunch with Sunny's father, and to visit his gravesite. Then it's off for day 3 of shooting, which is actually at NIGHT this time. It's our first few interior shots, so we'll be playing with the lights for a couple of hours.

Water's Edge Day 1

Today marked the first day of shooting on Water’s Edge, and it was a difficult one.



At 5:45, Mark (the script supervisor) and I woke up, already 15 minutes behind schedule. We tried to follow Russ out to the location we were shooting at, but he wasn’t quite sure where it was either. We didn’t show up for our 6:30 call time until 6:45. It was 7:30 before we actually shot anything. Every shot took twice as long as I had budgeted for. Our 7 hour shooting day took almost 12 hours.



That’s an entire day spent under the hot, hot sun. We were shooting the Dockett home exteriors, on this trailer lot way out in the middle of nowhere. The owners were very gracious too us, even when we told them they couldn't take their boat out to the lake, because it was already in some of the shots.



It stopped being fun after the first 6 hours. My neck is on fire, and despite drinking 3 bottles of water, I still have grains of salt caking my forehead. Time for a nice cold shower, aspirin, and a trip to the grocery store…then LOTS of sleep.



Tomorrow’s day is scheduled for just under 9 hours. We’ll see.

Saturday

Another night has bled into day; this one deeper than usual. I haven't been to sleep at all. Not good, considering I'm supposed to have lunch with the Big Men's group today, and a date with Milton.

Anyway, I just posted a poem I wrote way back when I still had things to say, and decided to post some commentary along with it, since I'm sure that taken at face value it would probably upset a lot of readers. (Do I have a lot of readers?) After all the proofreading, corrections, etc; it took about 4 hours. Then, for some reason, I spent about another hour just reading the post over and over again. "Apocalypse" is really one of the most powerful things I've written, in my opinion.

Yesterday, I mowed the lawn; first mow of the year. It went ok with Tom's electric mower, but I hate pulling the cord around. I mowed his lawn once last year, and the grass was so thick, the engine kept dying. This time, I felt bad for mowing over the ant hills. Sure, scientists SAY they have no sense of pain, fear, humiliation...but since they aren't sure how we processes emotion, they can't say for sure. Those buggers work hard building their castles, and having them wiped out every few weeks is probably emotionally devastating...if they have emotions. On the other hand, it'd be inconvenient to try and mow around them. I guess I've just become more open to the possibility since Sunny's death. I keep thinking ever bug I squash could be him living out his Karma. But in Sunny's case, I guess he'd probably come back as something more dignified than an ant or spider or bee. I haven't killed anything else lately.

Apocalypse

I. Apocrypha


I heard God's voices
canticles of fear
sung by broken zombies
who waited too long
The World
Moves On


"The mice
have eaten all the corn"
seven sopranos sang
Lean, dark-eyed saints
waltzing in the grain
They fell beneath
Fate's harvester
Sing a mournful song
The World
Moves On


Only the spiders, roaches, rats
had worn their weapons well
Their jaws were loath to tell
secrets (I stopped to ask)
But I instead heard
God's voices curse and swear
the secrets are somewhere
beyond
The World
Moves On



II. The Station


A lovely blonde
with no business there
among those creatures of the night
They bought she sold
The air grew stale and old


Those large men
with drunk, red eyes
and feeble women
pretending to be strong,
they all knew--Someday
The World
Moves On


Resting grew exhausting
waiting took too long
Metros kept moving
They could not get on
Sitting gargoyles
craving midnights
that never come
So they bury their fathers
take husbands, wives


Large men speak
of motors and gears
Women wish
for magic in tears
The World
Moves On



III. A Game of Poker


Harold dealt the cards
five to a hand
"Joker's Wild"


"No one cut the deck"
Todd balked


"It doesn't matter"
I said
holding three aces
"You'd have drawn the same.
Fate doesn't cheat,
she's just a cruel bitch."


"I saw a blonde yesterday"
Harold said
"headed to L.A.
Thinks she'll be a star"


I thought of the woman
at the station
in the night


"I was there"
Todd said
"looked like a whore
if you ask me"


I tossed two cards
Todd also
Harold tossed three


Todd said
"If fate don't cheat
let me draw first."


I nodded
He drew


I drew both Jokers
"The next Monroe"
I said



IV. The House of Dreams
(Rat Infested Hellhole)


I saw
Melies' dream
Buster Keaton, Mary Pickford
Gene Kelly, Julie Andrews


I saw
Cary Grant, Orson Welles
Marilyn Monroe, Lauren Bacall


Shot down
by Edward G. Robinson


I saw
John Wayne
Harrison Ford
Billy Bob Thornton
crooked heroes
with hearts of gold


And I saw
the rage
of old war battles
the terror of aliens
bloody axes
chainsaws
knives


(on video)


The World
Moves On



V. Death by Convenience


The River chokes
on empty bottles
sandwich wrappers
cardboard boxes
cigarette butts and
styrofoam cups


Jack, the cherub,
and I sit in his truck
on the bank
during lunch


We discuss the weather
and whether
it is hotter this year than last
and hotter last than in the past


Are the winters colder,
or Old Man Winter merely older?
Is the world to burn?
The earth to freeze?
Both perhaps?
Holocaust, and nuclear night
All in all
who'll be left to say who's right?


"If these," Jack queries,
"are our dying days,
what's worth saving that we should save?"


I crush a soda can
and fling it into the cluttered woods
"All" I say


Jack's gentle hand
grasps my knee
"Better you go on than me."


I love him now
his sacrifice
and if these are our dying days
why should that be so hard to say?


Because silence is convenient
and convenience--
convenience is a thing to die for


Jack turns the key
His truck coughs on gas
"Times up," he says
and roars away



VI. The Rainstorm


God said to take my umbrella
Harold laughed
I took it anyway


Sun cooked the flesh
moving along the streets
tucked away in three-piece suits
shorts, shirts, tennis shoes


Heat baked
girls on skates
and ugly children--
bastards of the night
who can no longer
melt into the shadows
Stragglers sweat and shiver
in alleys which smell
of urine and alcohol
Psychotic vets harping
"If you haven't got a ha'penny
God Fuck You!"


I whacked 'em left and right
with my umbrella


And then the rains fell


Drops of fire from heaven
scorching the earth clean
But things went too far
and the only survivors--
Me with my umbrella
and the spiders
who spun their own


Even now
The World
Moves On



VII. Apocalypse


I feast on sand and spider webs
listen to rat-souls speak
of how they meant to sacrifice
the frightened and the weak
to slay the past--paschal lamb--
upon the altar of unsure fate



My teeth have grown sharp
my face gone furry
I killed my brother
a thousand times each day
now it's spiders
that I slay


I have seen in long, dark dreams
a silo full of souls
where every man born to die
cries in litanies of accusation
"Why why why?"


The earth but mud
beneath my feet
while God chants in voices
the names of the dead
and the lies they told


God clothes me
in his loneliness
confesses all his sins
of poker, movies, plastic bags
of cornfields, mice, and men


God and I
have said and done
everything we can
leave this world to spider webs
infinities of sand